HomeAwayReviews 1,751

We decided to rent a house in new hampshire this past summer. Everything started out well, until we got there that is! The house was in disrepair, moldy, dirty, water stained toilet, no lava rocks in the grill, etc., etc. upon arrival, knew we wouldn't be staying there. So we tried to call the person who rented us the property. After 52 pone calls she finally decided to contact us. the cost of the rental is still in dispute. We ended up at another property, but the damage had already been done! STAY AWAY FROM HOME AWAY! I HAVEN'T EVEN RECEIVED MY SECURITY DEPOSIT BACK YET.

I've had 3 properties listed with HA for 3 years and have always been really happy with the leads, service and 'quality' of guests.

Short version - be aware! They are great if things run smoothly, but will not budge when there is an issue ( even if they are 100% at fault).

Long version below.

HA Australia has now been sold to Stayz and my listings (which are overseas) will not be supported once their 12-month subscription ends. No worries so far. I'm happy to move my listing to the US at the end of the AU tenure.

But I had reviews on the AU listing that had taken years to accumulate. Any home-owner knows how hard it is to solicit reviews.

HA AU agreed to have the reviews appear on the US listings. I was advised to do it all at once when the 1st property was due for renewal, even though I had 5 and 10 months left on the other 2. The HA CS agent and I both assumed that they would be copied to the new HA US listings.

But they moved the reviews, rather than coping them. So now I'm left with a Global Listing with no reviews for the 2 properties that are still on the AU platform.

Listing on the AU site was much cheaper than US. HA AU have offered a refund for the months I have left on the AU site. But if I want my complete listings with reviews, it will cost me an addition $1100.

I have already paid and contracted with HA AU for a global listing for 12 months. But now it will cost $1100 for exactly the same listing for the remainder of my 12 months. Entirely due to their mis-information.

I have tried to resolve with HA AU, but they are only offering a pro-rated refund of the unused months on AU (and only from now and not 2 months ago when the reviews disappeared). I don't want a refund - I want my listing live with reviews for the full 12 months that I have contracted with HA AU to provide.

I will lodge a complaint with Australian Consumer Protection as they have not " given the results that you and the business had agreed to" under the Australian Consumer Guarantee.

Home Owners - Be ware!

My advise is dont advertise with them. I had 30 5 stars reviews my property is immaculate, well maintained & cut above many.

I had a guest that trashed my Games room which is part of the house with AC ect. Their 4 children aged 7 to 13 bashed the ceiling & all 4 walls with a pool cue, broke then end off the cue, then used the cue with no end to play pool, they put 17 tears into the newly covered pool table. The room was so bad it needed decorating, the pool table needed recovering. They left the pool deck with trash where they dropped it, the bins where full of maggots where they had thrown food into them, in high heat.
HomeAway will allow that guest that had no respect for my home, leave a 1star rating because I would not be blackmailed by the guest into refunding their Security Deposit. I am well out of pocket & now, the guest accuses me of fraud & much more & HomeAway will publish the report to trash my Business. I will of course be seeing HomeAway & the Guest in court for printing that I am a fraud & other information that is totally untrue.

On day 2 of this guests stay they wrote to me & asked to stay longer as the place was so nice. I have all the emails & pictures but HomeAway would not discuss with us & in fact I had to make 4 calls because 3 times HomeAway just hung up on me.

NOW HOW fair is this. Yes not at all

An update

Finally HomeAway saw sense & stopped th 3rd version of the review from being published but I had to point out that under UK law they could not use the material in the review because it was liable but what a fight to get justice. There is something wrong with their system that can trash innocent people that actually pay their wages with the costly advertising fees.

We have always advertised with Owners Direct and now they have been taken over by Homeaway it is terrible, the enquiries we are getting have reduced significantly and to update the Homeaway site is just sheer hell. We are also with Homeaway pre pay bookings but none of the guests want to pay Homeaway direct because of all the terrible tales on the website blog about Homeaway not paying the owners and therefore the owners not honouring the guests booking. Mistakes on where the actual accommodation is etc etc. Really feel that I am going to cancel my listing with Homeaway.

I have used Homeaway Vacation Home Rentals to book my vacation rental. HomeAway offers the best selection of properties around the world. The website is very user friendly and connects clients to homeowners or property managers instantly.
Additionally you do not have to worry about paying as they offer a variety of very trusted options to secure your money.
Although they also own VRBO.com, I personally like the layout of Homeaway.com as I find the layout and navigation are more user friendly.

I would never use this website again! After searching and looking at listing for several weeks I found one that I had seen listed several times before and that was available for our stay. Only after I had already paid for this rental and was traveling to the location did I receive an email from HomeAway informing me that the listing may be fraudulent and not to send any money. I called them right away and they really didn't care about my situation. We were using the rental as somewhere for our family to stay while we had surgery. They offered me no help in finding another place and told me there was nothing they could do!

I have a luxury suite in the 5* Faena Hotel in buenos aires. https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/******* I use airbnb to rent it out. I have never ha a problem nor had to pay crazy prices for it to be listed. I'm on my holiday in lima peru and decided to torchue myself with this stupid site! I spent 2 days perfecting all there requests. Photo, titles, pricing, season, bio's... EVERYTHING! Just in the end be declined by their only banking processing center. They had no answer for me. Said it could be anything. They also have no other options for there processing. As I now look at there reviews. I should of just went with another company from the begining! They could not tell me why this would not go through. I called homeaway 3 times! They finally just gave me back my $1,000 us dollars. Airbnb is 3% of your total booking. NO DRAMA! Like I said. DONT BOTHER WITH THIS SITE!

I have been providing rental apartments over 8 years. This summer I decided to give a try to Homeaway (also their sub network VBRO). I received one booking last summer. Homeaway sent me an email that stating the guest made the full payment to Homeaway. So I delivered the accommodation and service. I suppose to receive the payment 1-5 business days, after the check out! But I have been told that the credit card was duplicated after waiting waiting 5 days... therefore cannot send the payment to my account... and "according to the policy, in such situation they do not take responsibility! I couldn't believe it. The renter also damaged my bed and trashed the place... I took my listing down... last month, since it is winter/low season, I want to give a try one more time... I got a booking. It's booked for 1 person but they end up 3 people in the apartment, partying and smoking... I cancelled their since smoking is zero telrorated in my apartments and subject to immediate cancellation. They have stolen our Dyson, over $250 value heater&cooler. I have reported Homeaway. I still did not receive the payment, which I have been told that; since they smoke in the apartment I have right to cancel their booking and I suppose to receive the full payment and the keep the deposit, I have not even received the deepest so far... Though, it appears to me that they are so used to this type of people, yet they attract these type of people... They simply don't care if you are a real howt and real guest... Conclusion is, if you are a true, decent host or true, decent renter you simply have no value in Homeaway's eye. They just into charging people's money and won't give a damn to anyone when a problem occurs... Stay away from them period!.

I rented a private apt in London and paid in full - a rental, cleaning fee and security deposit for a three day stay.An hour later I received a paypal money request from flatbookfor a second security fee. I called home away and flatbookfor that apologized as a "clerical error". The apt turned out to be a bedroom in a shared house with only a mattress, we didn't stay and asked for a refund. Home away said we are only an advertiser talk to flatbook, flatbook said, we are in Canada and are not responsible for bad descriptions. Neither refunded me anything not even my security deposit. Don't be a victim like me, use reputable hotels, home away is a scam

To be fair, we are several weeks out for staying at our rental but my experience with the website and marketing onslaught has left me VERY frustrated. Be prepared to be spammed to the upper limits. I opted out of marketing emails to begin with, which they entirely ignored. Even after opting out of email marketing MULTIPLE times in my preferences on their site... I am still getting hit right and left with spam materials. If you give them your email address... be prepared to have you inbox full of an onslaught of junk materials. For this reason alone... I consider this a real lack of respect for their customers... I will never use them again.

I recently book a homeaway site for vacation... Unfortunately, I think someone was able to use my credit card infor from the web site as on the same day,,,, someone fraudulently used the same card and book thousands of dollars of travel with it! Of course the credit card company did not charge me. But it is very frustrating that this could happen I called homeaway and told them they need to check their website and be more secure... they weren't to concerned about it! Maybe someone who works for them did this? Just very coincidental that all happened the same day and travel charges were involved

On August 7-9, myself and nine others rented Jack Bell's yacht, otherwise known as the Morning Mist. This yacht usually resides in San Francisco, however, since we wanted to enjoy the water activities ( jet ski, boat, kayak), Jack Bell moved the location to the Delta, and anchored the yacht onto a "private island".

Beware: the private island consists of weeds, and a little bit of sand in front of the weeds that is only noticeable in the morning during low tide (false advertisement)... he made it seem as though it was beautiful when in actuality your trip will consist of staring at weeds.

Jack Bell and his wife Trisha were horrible. They should not be renting out their yacht. Long story short, we basically rented the yacht to conform and comply with their needs, as opposed to them catering to their guests (such as a hotel that rents rooms to others). We basically paid for them to be our guests.

Here is what you should expect f you rent this yacht:

1. You will be checked up on every two minutes (not exaggerating)

2. You will not be supplied with power after 1 a.m. (so charge your phones early, and don't you dare try to watch a movie. By the way, when the power is out, so is flushing power to toilets, so prepare for the stench)

3. You can not listen to the music you'd like ( as they stated, they are Christian- so you must cater to them)

4. Trish freaking out, stressing and pouring glasses of wine to cope with thinking her husband is practicing infidelity with women who are on the boat.

5. Trish spazzing out and yelling while running into her cabin stating, "I can't take this anymore" (very unprofessional)

6. Threatened to have the coast guard called on you because you drink alcohol.

7. Your food/ drinks being thrown out (they are inconsiderate- we made food and tea in which Trish threw out when she was making breakfast- even though the kettle was still hot... common sense would tell you that it was barely made and we are not leaving it there for you to clean, we will gladly do so ourselves)

8. Toilets not working. ( the smell of the toilets stunk so bad, it was hard to sleep with the stench)

9. Rude remarks from Jack Bell ( he made comments about a woman's weight on the yacht).

10. Tons of spiders and mosquitoes ( I went home with at least ten bites)

11. Murky water

12. Old water toys that break down (yacht, boat, jet ski).

Positive:

1. Breakfast is included, and is good.

As I stated earlier, these people rent their yacht out with expectations that their guests are there to conform to them, as opposed to them catering to their guests. They should not rent their yacht out since that is their expectation.

They provided each and every one of us with a horrible weekend.
Oh, and by the way, the yacht is not very pretty, it looks better in pictures.

We called the property manager, Suzie M., in an attempt to be reassured about the availability and access to the TN cabin we rented for the week. Our first phone call was not returned before we left on our trip. We called from VA to get the access code, but the manager said we could not get in until she received the agreement in the mail even though payment in full was received via credit card. If they demanded such a speedy return of the the rental agreement, they should have made the agreement returnable by email. When I asked if I would be refunded if I lost a night or two, Ms. M. would not respond. The entire tone of the conversation on her part was abrupt and rude. Please take the advice of the preponderance of reviews and STAY AWAY from HomeAway!

In June 2015, my family and I (who travel frequently) rented a house called Cascade Mountain Retreat in Colorado for several days and it was nothing like described on their website. In fact, upon arrival, we thought we might be at the wrong place. We contacted HomeAway who quickly told us we had to take any problems up with the owner (who we never even knew their name). The crooked woman (Julia) we had dealt with to reserve the place finally texted me back after 8 hours (the wifi and phone service were basically non-existent) and started arguing with me, pretending to not understand what I was saying and actually trying to convince me that I liked the place because others had! She said nothing else was available and she had our money so we were totally at her mercy. It cost us $2260 for 4 people for 6 days at a 50 year old house that stunk and didn't even have any movie channels on the only television in the place. We had to buy our own toilet paper, paper towels, clean the place before we left and were instructed to take our trash to a nearby business and put it in their dumpster! We were charged a "service fee" of $50 and a "cleaning fee" of $150, yet were given strict instructions about how to clean the place before we left or we would not get our deposit back! When I tried to talk with Julia, she only argued with me and said there was nothing she would do about it - our tough luck. Beware of anyone associated with VRBO, HomeAway or Julia W! They are crooks and should be investigated and prosecuted.

I was seeking a cottage rental for a long weekend and their website showed availability. In good faith, I gave my credit card information (temporary hold for the full amount of the rental) and waited for 24 hours. I received an email from Canada Stays declining my booking. I was told by Canada Stays that property has been rented for the complete summer. THIS IS FALSE ADVERTISING. Homeaway argument on why THEIR WEBSITE is not up to date? "It is that it is the responsibility of the managing company or property owner to provide the status to them".
What Homeaway fails to understand is that they SHOULD NOT advertise on THEIR WEBSITE a property that they do not know the status of. I have spoken to three representatives and who hung up on me, was promised a managers phone call to answer the questions. It never happened.
This company refuses to take responsibility for their actions but will blame property owners / managing companies for their short comings. The solution, managing companies and/or property owners should update their availability daily and by a certain time. Failing this, Homeaway doesn't show availability on their site or show the property. Consumers will have up to date information and can make an informed decision on their vacation.
Hopefully through this review and others like mine, consumers will be given factual information and make an informed decision whether to move forward with Homeaway. It is MORE than what Homeaway gave me.

This property manager from Home Away has very poor management skills and should not be renting a vacation house. I had to cancel my weekend stay due to unforeseen circumstances. I understand that It was a week away from the rental date and I would not get a full refund. However Sharon O'Toole failed to update her website reflecting this cancellation. It was a summer month and she could have easily turned over the property, issuing me a refund. She kept the website updated as "unavailable" and just stole my money instead of doing the proper thing. Home Away customer service did not help at all with this situation. They said I am on my own with this issue and it is only between myself and the property owner. If they are managing the name of "Home Away" they need to make sure they have reliable renters who don't scam you. They did not reprimand the property manager AT ALL.